Flaming Telepaths - Imaginos Expanded and Specified

by Martin Popoff

In 1967, a now deceased prophet known as Memphis Sam—H.P. Lovecraft reincarnated—wrote the rough outline of a cryptid-encrypted tall tale purported to explain the occult origins of World War I.

Five years later, a band called Blue Öyster Cult would begin disseminating pieces of the story across their albums, with the biggest data dump coming in 1988, on a record of theirs called Imaginos.

This book proposes, as the title suggests, an “expanded and specified” deep tissue massage of Sandy Pearlman’s crypto-wordology, with the author performing, as a mason would, the slathering of mortar between the bricks of the castle-keep that Pearlman built for the band he managed to great fame, most notably with Agents of Fortune en route to Fire of Unknown Origin, an alchemically charged grimoire much like the book with which you are absurdly about to interact.

Come dance the dance of time, as “modified child” Imaginos shape-shifts his way through the 1800s toward the Great War, slashing and shredding the psychic fabric along the way through a series of possessions including those of Poe, Bierce, Lovecraft, Crowley, Austin Osman Spare and perhaps, as most recklessly speculated by the fevered author, Winston Churchill.

Genres: Music, Horror

200 pages, Paperback

Published March 1, 2021

About the author

At approximately 7900 (with over 7000 appearing in his books), Martin has unofficially written more record reviews than anybody in the history of music writing across all genres. Additionally, Martin has penned approximately 85 books on hard rock, heavy metal, classic rock and record collecting. He was Editor-In-Chief of the now retired Brave Words & Bloody Knuckles, Canada’s foremost metal publication for 14 years, and has also contributed to Revolver, Guitar World, Goldmine, Record Collector, bravewords.com, lollipop.com and hardradio.com, with many record label band bios and liner notes to his credit as well. Additionally, Martin has been a regular contractor to Banger Films, having worked for two years as researcher on the award-winning documentary Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage, on the writing and research team for the 11-episode Metal Evolution and on the ten-episode Rock Icons, both for VH1 Classic. Additionally, Martin is the writer of the original metal genre chart used in Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey and throughout the Metal Evolution episodes. Martin currently resides in Toronto and can be reached through martinp@inforamp.net or www.martinpopoff.com.

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was definitely one of the more batshit-crazy things I've ever read... and this is coming from a guy who has read just about everything the fertile imaginations of Stephen King, H.P. Lovecraft & Terry Pratchett wrote that was available in a decent-sized print run. This takes Sandy Pearlman's Imaginos story - which on a basic level is was about a chameleon-like entity named Imaginos that has lived through various ages introducing evil into the world to see how humanity reacts - and then ties it into real events leading up to WWI.

The gist of the book, is more or less a chronological guide to the possible occult origins of WWI by having Imaginos interact with, or actually inhibit the bodies of: Lovecraft, Aleister Crowley, Hitler, various Rosicrucian & Thelemite leaders - as well as members of Blue Öyster Cult, The Grateful Dead and The Doors... among countless others. So yeah - crazy stuff. And right in my wheelhouse.

[Clint Jones · Rating 2 out of 5]

Popoff blends a wide array of sources from key figures in the occult to Led Zeppelin, and thinner flights of fancy from Doors and Grateful Dead lyrics. Popoff is careful to explain early on that the lines within which he is drawing are playfully vague.

If you’re looking for a straight documentary of how the Imaginos saga developed, this may not be right for you. It’s closer to a fiction story in the form of a pseudo occult study presented in a timeline format. There are deep insider references ranging from historical and rock biographies to purely tongue-in-cheek apophenia. The occult chronology is dry and fragmented, yet it serves as a reasonable extension and parody of the original album liner, lyrics and diverse Sandy Pearlman anecdotes.

It’s not something I would read again, as I would Agents of Fortune: The BOC Story. It was something vaguely similar to taking a break to play with a thematic crossword puzzle specially taken from the Imaginos story. It had me in mind for its audience theoretically, but fell off a cliff in practice. I was disappointed like a Steven King fan might be if he gave them a ghost story, but it ended up being about Casper instead of a pair of creepy twin girls.

For a taste, consider listening to his History in Five Songs podcast, ep. #70: "Imaginos and Re Imaginos" (It's that, and more of the same).